Documentary 'When We Stop Counting' to Premiere on Campus

How do you educate all children, especially when 50 percent of your school system suddenly becomes minority? It happened in Crete.

How the community responded to that demographic change is the focus of a documentary that premieres on Doane College's Crete campus Thursday, Oct. 28 at 7 p.m. in Heckman Auditorium.

When We Stop Counting attempts tohumanize the issues of education, immigration and the future, following six Hispanic Crete High School students and their families through their personal struggles and triumphs as they strive to achieve the American Dream. In addition to students recording their own footage of experiences at school, home, work and play, the documentary also includes insights from administrators, faculty and scholars on how schools can serve as a center for a community.

"I think, when all the right people come together to say we can embrace this change, good things can happen," said Elisabeth Reinkordt, one of the documentary's producers.

The Doane screening is free and open to the public and will be followed by a dessert reception in the Great Hall lobby (in front of the auditorium). Multicultural Support Services is sponsoring the premiere.

The Mary Riepma Ross Media Arts Center in Lincoln will serve as a second site for the film's premiere. That screening is set for 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 26. Both events will include a question-and-answer period with the directors, students and others involved in the project.

When We Stop Counting was shot, directed and produced by Brent Meier of El Centro de las Américas and Elisabeth Reinkordt of the Nebraska Department of Education.